Monday, April 29, 2013

Even the most important witnesses get betrayed when the powerful are threatened

The New York Times front page story by Ginger Thompson reports on the saga of Luis Octavio López Vega. For years, Lopez has been living underground in the U.S. He is former chief of police of Zapopan, a city of more than 1,000,000 near Guadalajara, and top aide to former Gen. Jesus Gutierrez Rebolllo (praised by ONDCP Director Barry McCaffrey for his bullet-proof integrity before he was arrested for his ties to a cartel). Lopez was a key DEA informant. As the investigation of Gutierrez commenced, Lopez realized that he was a target for execution and went underground. The U.S. helped his family escape to the U.S.

For a dozen years, top Mexican officials have been trying to get the U.S. to arrest Lopez to turn him over to them, where it is likely, the Times suggests, that he will be tortured and killed. Yet the U.S. Marshals Service raided him -- but he spotted the surveillance and fled. He has been hiding out ever since.

This extensive report confirms our worst suspicions that considerations of justice are abandoned when powerful politicians and powerful criminals feel threatened, and when the trade and political interests of the U.S. may be affected. In this account, the decisions of the U.S. Attorney General and the Secretary of State about protecting a man who was offered protection by the U.S. for his life-endangering cooperation are swayed by political considerations. When does a government betray someone it has offered to protect?

Drug enforcement is such a peculiar species of law enforcement. No matter how zealously anti-drug agents, prosecutors or officials might be, they all recognize at some level, because the drug trade is so large and perpetual, that any individual load of drugs or any individual defendant is ultimately insignificant. Considerations of national security, national economics, and national politics -- if pressing -- will always trump any investigation.

Is this a form of corruption? Or is it a necessary exercise of discretion? Is letting a cartel leader go for reasons of state legally or morally different than letting a juvenile street dealer go for reasons of compassion and retaining the human capital of a community?

2 comments:

Copy of my email sent to my last online supplier: To C (@yahoo.com): Howzit C, First of all, turns out I had some Kratom (60x) laying around the home for several months but thought it was kava root and didn't try drinking any until 3 weeks ago and unfortunately it's just not my cup of tea since there's no mental high like with cannabinoids. But on the bright side of the equation I finally read the final notice on the [spice] ban and lo & behold it turns out I have to concur 100% and it's exactly what this industry needed in order to curb abuse while at the same time actually encourage usage soon as someone registers it or in other words the wording of the ban couldn't be more perfect and actually shows that we're all on the same side and there's no smell of corruption coming out of our Drug Enforcement Agency after all. Unless someone else beats me to the punch I may end up being the first legal distributor in the U.S. with the aim of strongly emphasizing a recommended dosage of 1 dose per every 3 hours in regards to the active ingredient of synthetic cannabinoids. I had already long day-dreamed of labeling the truth on the packaging of spice as to how it helps to alleviate suicidal depression akin to cannabis. As for cannabis, I only deal in it when I ever happen to get it very cheaply in order to pass the savings on to my customers and thereby help in reducing the level of violence within the community but most times it's way too expensive to make it feasible to deal in. In fact, a couple or so years ago a blurred picture of myself made it into the local newspaper in regards to the homelessness crisis in Hawaii. Every major city has its own Chinatown along with its own nearby skid-row and drug-alley or in other words find its Chinatown and look for the nearest park and there you have it. Over here it's called Aala (ah-ala) Park and the article in the newspaper is about sweeping the sidewalks of homeless folks but doesn't mention that the whole bunch of us surrounding the perimeter of the park all happen to be street drug dealers of one substance or another and for me it was cannabis until I was finally enlightened about synthetic cannabinoids around a year and a half ago. I'm probably still months away from starting the paperwork of registering in person with our Drug Enforcement Agency but I see no other alternative than to some day be a major distributor in order to force the price of cannabis to be lowered which is exactly what I do at the park whenever I manage to get cannabis cheap enough which doesn't happen often enough. The other street dealers don't like it when I do that but they tolerate it because it's convenient for them to simply buy from me when they happen to sell out of their own stock early in the day and then still be able to make a small profit buying from me rather than calling it quits for the day. I was getting all hyped up over flooding the street scene with syn'noids before this year is up until the ban hit and put a temporary hold on everything for the time being. I'm so far behind on paperwork and still need to renew my State I.D. with my current address before I can even bother to start the registration process, and in fact it looks like I might as well legalize opium too. Just among family talk it's a well known family secret that one of my grandfathers used to be the State's main opium supplier during the early 1900's. (And dig this, when Sun Yet-sen had to flee for his life when Mao's Communist Party overpowered the Democratic Nationalist Movement, Sun Yet-sen hid in my dad's home when my dad was just a kid.) Meanwhile, all this System is asking for is for somebody to register things so that there's some sort of overseer in order to standardize things safely in leiu of the wild west free for all scenario that it has been. (To be continued...)

(Continued...) Just be absolutely sure to only get approval from our Food and Drug Administration without letting them tamper with the product(s). Here's a quote from one of our former FDA commissioners who got in trouble within the industry for making a truthful comment to a small local newspaper which was later picked up by the big syndicates: Dr. Herbert Ley, former FDA commissioner, remarked: “The thing that bugs me is that the people think the FDA is protecting them. It Isn’t. What the FDA is doing and what the public thinks it’s doing are as different as night and day.” FINAL ORDER [Spice Ban] URL: http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/fed_regs/rules/2013/fr0516.htm. And did you hear the news about Colorado [State] being the first in the world to legalize and market cannabis as of May 20, 2013. Take care, C, and aloha 'til next time, Dr. (h.c.) Michael Tsark

[Tsark's NOTE To Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (L.E.A.P.): Recommended Homework -- Confessions of a Medical Heretic by Robert S. Mendelsohn.]

[Tsark's NOTE to L.E.A.P.: If any of us bluecoats don't like the way us whitecoats are simply doing our legal job-duty then change the way this System legally operates and don't retaliate.]

[Tsark's NOTE to L.E.A.P. via PayPal $10 donation w/optional message July 4, 2013: To whom it may concern: I need to please replace the teeny L.E.A.P. police badge pin I had received upon my previous $5 donation which I wore on top of my police cap's badge patch that was broken off and lost in a very minor sting-bait scuffle during my volunteer undercover branch business street activities dbaWORLD POLICE (in affiliation with Detective Abe Mallari of our Honolulu Police Department's Criminal Intelligence Unit), thank you very much. Sincerely yours, Dr. (h.c.) Michael Tsark]